The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

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SEATTLE, Wednesday—In this part of the country they seem to be carrying on a very active and intelligent campaign for cancer control. I have been asked to attend several meetings since I have been here. This morning Dr. O'Shea asked me if I would care to see a unique clinic, which they run in connection with the Swedish Hospital, for the study and care of cancer. Since I am leaving tonight, I shall not be able to visit this clinic until I return, but it is a very satisfactory thing to find this part of the country doing its share so valiantly in the fight being waged against cancer.

I remember my horror when I visited a Government financed hospital near my own home and was told that their x-ray machine was so old that they hardly dared use it for fear of burning their patients, and that they had no radium to treat a case of cancer. It seems to me that any institution run by the Government should be doing the best possible work from an experimental and scientific standpoint and should serve as a model for all private institutions. This, unfortunately, is not always the case. Some State and Federal institutions can be pointed to with pride, but all should have the same high standards.

The weather is so beautiful today that I am almost sorry that I shall be flying over the mountains at night and shall miss all the beauty I remember so vividly on my last trip home by this route. Perhaps, I may have glimpses of the white snow beneath us, for that should show up even at night. Maybe I shall catch a glimpse of Mt. Rainier's white-capped dome as we fly by. I see by the papers that the Norwegian Crown Prince and Princess are to go skiing when they come out here. I am afraid that they will have to go quite far up the mountains, but I am sure that nothing will make them feel more at home. This part of the country, I am told, resembles their native land, particularly along the coast.

Dr. Warren E. Tomlinson, of the Department of German in the College of Puget Sound, Tacoma, Washington, tells me of a most interesting venture which he has been carrying on since 1937 and which he is now hoping to expand. On Orcas Island, in the San Juans, he has over 75 people camping out together, talking only the language which they have come to study. He is now planning additional camps for the study of foreign lanuages, German, French and Spanish. The object is not only to gain fluency in conversation, but to attain a greater knowledge of the cultures of these different countries.

There have been some language camps in various places in the East that I have heard about, but I have thought of them as largely organized for children and young people. In the case of these camps out here, all ages can be included and they are of great value to teachers and professors. I have a great belief that knowledge of foreign languages is a tremendous help toward the better understanding of our neighbors throughout the world and am glad to see us developing a greater interest in this type of culture.

E.R.

(Copyright, 1939, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)


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  • Seattle (Wash., United States) [ index ]


About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, April 6, 1939

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
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Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

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Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
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MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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